This "roomie wanted" ad from Craigslist is.. so very, very special. Imagine it read by a very calm John Cleese, with just a hint of a nervous tic. It needs to be read in its entirety; the reward grows as you proceed.

What is Scion City? (Streaming Flash video; this is but the first part. Surprisingly decent voice acting, too)

Well, that's a bit of a change.. I can remember two of today's dream segments, and both were furry. One was set in SL, and the other simply involved a very nice fur who insisted on a warm kiss.

If you've pondered returning to University lately, how about the University of Michigan's "How to be Gay: Male Homosexuality and Initiation", part of English 317? "Just because you happen to be a gay man doesn't mean that you don't have to learn how to become one."

InformationWeek apparently regularly hosts techie presentations on Dr. Dobb's Island in SL, with audio & slides presented on the web here. Times (Pacific) are 10am Tuesdays and noon on Fridays. (This week's was a grizzled Intel veteran now working on the Core 2 architecture, most recently the Penryn family)

Weren't there one or two furs keen on pinball hereabouts? Here's a shining example of a Doctor Who gem, cunningly concealed for preservation in an Ottawa bus station. ^_^ It is wonderful, ne?

Hangars Liquides seems like it might be worth exploring. It's a Blade Runner-like work in progress for a French electronica label: "Releasing artists such as I:gor and Neurocore from Poland, Senical (aka DJ choose) from Denmark, Bombardier from the USA, Noize Creator from Germany, Venetian Snares from Canada, Atomhead (aka Undacova) from Belgium, and French artists such as Al Zheimer, XKV8, Helius Zhamiq, Fist of Fury, Attila, EPC, La Peste and more, the label became a reference in itself: a lot of electronic music tracks from other labels have been described as having a "Hangars Liquides sound" or "Hangars Liquides style".

Since 2000, the label has released many different genres from acousmatic music to power electronics and flashcore. Flashcore identifies a style that some of those experimental artists share and a manifesto explains the aim of HL's vision of experimental music."

The ex-CTO of Linden Lab, Cory Ondrejka, is making etchings on the web in the form of collapsing geography - recommended for anyone who knows the name "Kurzweil". He remains in SL, with his familiar FSM av, under the cryptic monicker of "Cory Ondrejka".

A minor, but nonetheless significant, case: "On October 3, 2007, the California Court of Appeal unanimously affirmed the validity of a Board of Equalization rule that protects domestic partners from increased property taxes when one of the partners dies and the other inherits the couple's home. California law has long provided this protection for surviving heterosexual spouses."

An excellent music video, in a similar style to Tim Burton's stop motion works: Dionysos: Tais-toi mon coeur. No subtitles, but they're not necessary.

Mmmm, that did work out well. ^_^ Two pork escalopes, gently sauteed in a (very) little sesame oil, with some lemon juice splashed on, some garlic powder, and freshly ground black pepper. Towards the end, a dash of fish sauce, and a tablespoon or so of cranberry jelly, stirred around to make an easy glaze. Served with a mix of mangetout and baby corn microwaved for two minutes, and some spare fries that'd been sitting around. And - for the first time in two years - some lightly chilled Choya sake.

I suppose if anywhere would be home to such a worthy establishment, it would have to be Las Vegas. ^_^; (Not my kind of city, I'll admit; I'm more of a London, Sydney, or San Francisco sort. Now, if I could only stay put in any of them.. *sigh*)

That roomie request doesn't seem that odd, though I'd rather have someplace where I can have a cat, listen to loud music, and paint things. I wonder if he has problems with all paints, or if acrylic paints would be okay.

My guess is the awareness of the existence of paint in the house would be excessive. But we may never know, as rabitguy dug around a little, and discovered the posting was removed from Craigslist, for reasons unspecified.

Erf, indeed - spotted that on the official weblog. The timescale's a bit on the short side, but at least it's a positive amount of time, unlike the "Surprise, you've got VAT!" announcement, to which some folks were first alerted by a 20% hike in their bill.

Thankfully, no, I've never had anything to do with an in-world bank. I can see there being some legitimate use for such, but the lunacy that's been on display has just been a massive flashing red light - 50-200% APR interest? Nooo, nothing suspicious there..

Let's hope SL remains free of the similar insanity that's plagued the RL financial markets, too - "structured investment vehicles" bundling together high-risk assets, themselves consolidations of many individual loans of unknown worthiness, laughably deemed prime investment grade by Moody's or S&P, and thus bought by outfits seeking rock-solid investments, like pension fund managers. Hence the credit crisis - it's not a lack of liquidity that's the problem, but a complete loss of confidence in the crap each bank's holding. But it's as good an excuse as any to clean out the central banks..

Oof! Good point.. I hesitate to wonder as to the degree of maintenance a machine must require, if it's to be kept in good condition, though I'd hope things have improved over time, as rubber technology gradually improves. ("Rubber. Is there anything it can't do?")

It'd be totally impractical, but it strikes me a modest corral of pinball machines at a furcon could be a lot of fun. ^_^

It's fascinating just how difficult pinball is to replicate on a computer. Even aside from the actual tangibility, there seem to be so many subtle, fiendishly difficult aspects to model, if it's to look and feel as it might in reality. And that's not even considering the design of the game, of course. But, at least a good deal easier to fit into a tiny bedroom. =:)

Maybe it's that unusual combination that also makes snooker appeal to me as well, in a much more calculating environment - having to ascertain the situation, work out the best option from any that present themselves, and try applying just the right shot. And even if a pot isn't possible, to at least be able to make a legal shot, and leave your opponent with as poor prospects as possible. Fascinating game.

I only suggested some machines at a furcon on a whim, but.. you know, that really might be fun. ^_^ The odd casual game (who doesn't enjoy pinball?), and some good opportunities for 'suiters, as well as maybe a competitive hour - there's certainly a reasonable furry selection, especially if one pushed the edges to include Doctor Who. Ah, if only they could be flat-packed.. plainly, we must encourage the remnants of Bally (where did they end up?) to join a secret, elite IKEA team. ^_^

My interpretation of that "roommate wanted" ad is that it's "fake", but it was authored by someone who lived with "that person" (someone who regularly made completely unreasonable requests while offering little or no concessions in return other then volunteering to "pay more of the rent", which probably never happened.), and was of course lampooning them after escaping their clutches.

The real question is whether the target of the rant actually had a dog with both first and last names. ;^)

What, even the sizzling meat? ^_^ (Now there's a band name - or one for a gay dance troup in SL =:)

The problem with SL banking's been primarily a matter of promising crazy interest rates on deposits made, and usually not keeping nearly enough liquidity. Add in the previously laissez-faire attitude from Linden Lab, and you had cases where scammers could simply relieve the gullible of their money, and vanish without consequence. Ah well.

The thing with SL is that there aren't really any cities, or other large hubs analogous to RL, so it's not really feasible to head somewhere and take one's chances on finding a good place (though it's fun when that happens in either world!). Instead, it's quite a different distribution, of several or a few dozen folks in little clusters, more or less geographically random.

There are the usual furry suspects, of course, where you can pretty much always find people, like Sables dAlliez, Luskwood, and Furnation Aqua (et al). Then there are random events like last night's Bunny Rabbit Alliance dance, clubs like Pawprintz, AnthroXtacy, and the Rainbow Tiger, and regular events like Cobalt's Old Time Radio Theatre (over in Furnation Aqua, by the beach, underwater) every Saturday night. There's usually someone or other in the Serenity Woods sandbox, too, and Beast Mauvaise's Mechanical Beasts seems to've developed into a bit of a hangout joint. ^_^

And, of course, there are more popular venues like Prim Hearts (well worth a visit - you might be surprised how much fun a virtual theme park can be!), or the place whose name eludes me at the moment, with accurate models of a wide range of spacefaring rockets on display, along with various project proposals from outfits like NPL and NASA available for examination.

For other events, it's worth subscribing to Rik's Picks over on New World Notes and Science in SL, and scanning the events listings on the Linden Lab site. (The problem with the latter is it often carries a lot of repeating events, like LSL or building classes, rather than one-shots) Beyond that, I enjoy just keeping a slew of good SL weblogs in my RSS reader - makes it simple to keep abreast of some of the niftier discoveries and events.

Actually, that reminds me - I'd like to get along to a Cyberpiper gig sometime. Hafta check when he's next playing, and see if I can drag someone along for company. ^_^

I think all that fellow needs is a maybe a firm hand (or hoof) to guide him in how to be a nice room mate.

Thanks for the SL Links. I was bopping around a little at around 3am EST this morning. But it was pretty quiet most places around that time. Although I did manage to find a couple of congregated groups.